


i did not sign up for this at all

by Skittlethrill



Category: Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Gen, Just a Mention, M/M, Modern AU, What am I doing, but also canon meets modern AU, canon timur has his shit together, idk what im doing, modern timur has depression, no beta we die, theres like. a tiny bit of a kink talk in there at some point, what am i even doing oh my god
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-02
Updated: 2020-12-12
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:46:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,158
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27338896
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skittlethrill/pseuds/Skittlethrill
Summary: Timur Glazkov works in an art store. He paints, but recently he’s gone into a slump. What he can squeeze out is...troubling. A mysterious man with a toque and a long rifle. Hunting. Firing. He can’t escape him, and slowly he withdraws from his friends.Until one day, the man appears to him, in real life.
Relationships: Timur "Glaz" Glazkov & Shuhrat "Fuze" Kessikbayev, Timur "Glaz" Glazkov/Adriano "Maestro" Martello (former)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 13





	1. i want u to be happier

**Author's Note:**

> i've never played rainbow six before i just like the aesthetic

Timur opens his eyes, and it doesn’t take a genius for him to know that he’s slept past noon again. At least he isn’t late for his shift this time. He rubs at his forehead, feeling the sort of woozy you get when you sleep in a bit too long. He slept eight hours, yes, but the dark bags under his eyes are a testament to how long he’s been staying up.

Another morning missed, another day he’ll spend looking at the eternal work in progress on the easel. He’s tried so many things to kickstart the inspiration he knows is in there somewhere, but it won’t come out. He needs to add something, one more little touch that completes the landscape of the shipping yard at night, barely illuminated by the dim glow of streetlamps. It’s nigh finished. He could just get rid of it now, but he wouldn’t feel satisfied.

He doesn’t even bother making himself food, he barely feels hungry after he wakes up. Then again, his fridge is empty - he should probably go shopping for food, but he can barely find the motivation to leave the apartment. It feels dark outside, but mostly because it’s grey and cloudy. A glance at the clock reveals it’s 1:24.

There’s a knock on the door as Timur brushes his teeth - strange. He wasn’t expecting anyone today - no one ever comes by now. Maybe they have the wrong address, or maybe they’ll leave. Another knock. Timur sighs as he spits into the sink and starts getting dressed. Might as well look presentable for who decided to come over-

“Timur!” Aleksandr’s booming voice rings outside. “If you do not open this door, I am going to come through your window!”

Not again. “Сука- I’m coming!” He yells as he pulls a pair of sweatpants on and grabs his phone, rushing out the door and to the front. He breathlessly unlocks and opens the door, revealing Aleksandr staring down at him. In the van outside, Timur can see three others. Finka and Shuhrat exchange a fist bump as they laugh, and Maxim is on his phone. “I hate you, you know that?”

“I know. Are you well? Do you have any plans for today?” The larger man asks, but the two of them know fully well he doesn’t. “You haven’t responded to me, so I had to make sure you weren’t dead.”

“I’m fine. Nothing except work, what messages?” Timur pulls his phone out and reads the last few messages sent to him.

* * *

_ Time: 1:39 _

**Sasha:** Timur. How would you like to go to drinks with me and Shuhrat Friday?

**Sasha:** Timur?

**Sasha:** Is it true you haven’t left your apartment in *three days*?

**Sasha:** TIMUR

**Sasha:** That is it. If you do not respond to these messages by tomorrow, I am coming over to make sure you are not dead.

* * *

“Ah.” Timur says to himself. “...Can I have fifteen minutes?”

Sasha crosses his arms. “I’ll be counting.” Thankfully, fifteen minutes is more than enough time for Timur to put on a better looking sweatshirt and a beanie and pull himself into jeans, to grab his sketchbook he hasn’t touched in days but maybe might find use for. Once he exits he’s pulled into the van unceremoniously.

“Took you long enough.” Shuhrat chuckles to himself. Finka sticks her tongue out, but Maxim is too preoccupied with whatever is on his phone, and only gives a small wave.

“You better have a good reason for this.” Timur grumbles. It’s too cold for his liking. But it’s also woken him up, at least.

“What, I cannot gather my friends and make sure they are not  _ dead _ ?” He asks from the driving seat. “Three days, and  _ no one _ has heard from you.”

Timur scoffs at that. “Because I need to  _ focus _ , Sasha. Art cannot be rushed. Details take time.”

“Lighten up!” Shuhrat says as he reaches from the backseat and gives Timur a pat on the back. He likes that, the way he always ruffles his hat. “We care about you.”

It’s enough to quell his dampened mood - well, his mood was already damp before, so now it’s probably soaked. “So where are we going? I’d prefer not to be late for my shift.” He doesn’t even care, honestly, so he just opens up his sketchbook and stares at the blank page - might as well do something to pass the time, because he certainly isn’t in a talking mood. A vision pops into his mind, rudimentary as it is, and he takes out his pencil and begins sketching. It’s the one break he has from just...not caring, to be honest. A step up. A very tiny step up.

The car stops, and frankly, Timur’s head is starting to spin when he gets out, Shuhrat just after. “So, what have you been drawing, eh? Always with your sketchbook.” Turning around, the artist realizes he left his sketchbook in the van - and coming out, grinning, is Shuhrat, poring over the contents.

“Give that back!” But he’s too late, Shuhrat has already been exposed. His smug face falls as he sees the contents.

“...What is this?” He shows the sketch off, a rough one of a man wearing heavy tactical gear, or at least what Timur thinks is tactical gear. Earmuffs, a rifle, his face covered with piercing eyes. “I didn’t take you as the type who liked military things.”

“It just came to my mind.” He scoffs as he snatches the book back.

Shuhrat’s lips purse, but he shrugs, anyways. “Well, it’s pretty good! You should try colouring it.”

As much as he doesn’t want to admit it, Timur blushes a bit at that. Sasha is quick to herd everyone into the bar. “Enough chatting, both of you. Lunch is on me!”

* * *

“So he just woke you up and dragged you to a pub to have lunch.” Grace says as she restocks the paints into the shelves. “That doesn’t sound too bad.”

Timur just grunts in reply.

“Now, if they were making you pay, that’s a different story, but like, the other guy paid, right? So it’s not that bad.”

“It’s not about the money, Grace, I just want them off my back.”

The younger woman tosses her braids over her shoulders as she bends down, putting paint bottles in their correct spot. “You can’t be someone’s friend and let them stay in their apartment for three days without a good reason. Were you sick?”

Timur thinks for a bit. He hardly remembers those three days, except that he was completely sapped of energy to do anything. “...Sort of?”

“You didn’t tell them that?”

“How could I?”

Grace pointedly looks at Timur - they’re the only people in the store right now. “I dunno, something like ‘I’m not feeling so good and I think it’s contagious’ or something.”

“Don’t you have better things to do than pick at my life?” Timur complains. “Go clean out the storage lockers or something.”

“Already did. Look what I found.” Grace waves a red coupon in the air. He squints, like it’s supposed to mean something, and that’s not the reaction Grace wants, because her telling smirk slowly falls. “Uh, hello?”

“What?”

“It’s the coupon for that ramen place. The Rainbow Izakaya thing. You know? You always looked so excited when I invited you to go there.”

He remembers it, yes, but he’s not as excited now. “Great. My bank account is going to kill me.” Rolling his eyes, he plays with the pens in the cup holder by the register. “I’m learning to manage my money.”

“Couuuupon.” Grace sounds out, very slowly. “Does buy one get one free not mean anything to you? And it’s next to that shaved ice place you told me you wanted to visit Shuhrat with later-”

And that’s how Grace Nam convinced Timur Glazkov to accompany her three hours after work at a shaved ice place. The bowl in front of them is mountainous, covered with shaved ice, syrup, and toppings, a deep red colour that accentuates the bright green of matcha powder. He wants to capture that, too, but he knows he’d give up trying to mix the perfect colour of red.

“...We can finish this, right?”

“We’re two people. We can get takeout.” His coworker wastes no time snapping pictures of the enormous dessert bowl between them. “Now, let’s dig in!”

Timur takes his first spoonful. It’s very strange, seeing as it’s his introduction to eating red bean as a dessert, but it compliments the matcha powder and the strawberry syrup caked on top, and the mochi is so chewy.

“It’s good.” He says, and for a second, he can forget about everything, and he allows himself to smile for a bit. “I can’t believe I almost turned you down.”

“Right?”

They don’t finish the bowl, obviously, but they pack the remainder of melted ice and syrup and matcha powder into two small containers, and Timur chuckles as he steals a piece of mochi from Grace’s segment. It’s been a while since he remembers laughing like that, he muses, on the bus ride back to the apartment complex. 

As he fumbles with his key, he prepares himself for another few hours of staring at a canvas, wasting time looking at his phone or some other art project. It’s what he does, but halfway through, he grabs a blank canvas he meant to use for another project but has been blank for months now, mixes another set of colours, and gets to work.  Greens, blacks, greys. A far cry from his normally vibrant work. When they come together, a bunch of rudimentary brush strokes that somehow form a person, it makes someone who slightly resembles the man he drew that afternoon in the car.

It’s 4 am when he gets into bed, shivers and curls up. God, his life is sad, wasting away in front of an easel for things that will never be finished. Working in an art store. Slowly detaching from all the tethers that keep him alive. Never to contribute anything worthwhile because it’s always in progress. His head feels hollow, the bags under his eyes starting to weigh heavily.

Sometimes he wishes he could be painted over with white and start anew. “God, I hate myself.” He says, to no one in particular. When he falls asleep, he dreams of a man leagues powerful than he ever will be, whose face is hidden, a scar on his eye from strain, with a rifle, and then everything becomes muddled, as dreams usually do.

* * *

The next morning, Timur wakes up and expects to do nothing productive that day, but something is wrong. He’s always had an eye for detail, and even now, he can tell the shadows in his room are...off. Namely, one large one against the wall.

“Rise and shine. Took you long enough. That’s the first time you’ve woken up before noon this month.”

That voice is enough to really make the man sit up and get off his bed - he’s dressed in nothing but a sweatshirt and ratted shorts, and he stumbles over the clothes strewn on his floor. “Блядь - what the hell?!”

In front of Timur is a man dressed in tactical gear, with camouflage paint smeared on his face, anything below his nose hidden under a green mask. A headset covers his ears, and in his hands, a rifle. He has every mind to push him out, but even in his stupor, he knows not to mess with someone heavily armed.

“So this is what’s become of you? Lying in bed and pitying yourself? Well, could be worse, you’re doing something. You could have a drinking problem, wasting away on the couch in front of the television, poor Tachanka-”

Timur grits his teeth - he didn’t come here to be  _ judged _ by a  _ home intruder _ on  _ his lifestyle _ , of all things. “I know that - how the hell did you even get in?! What do you want?” 

“I have my ways.” The soldier replies. “I will tell you this once. I’m here to help.”

As Timur’s brain processes this, he recognizes the man’s look. That’s the man he drew, painted, the one who plagues his dreams and mind. “It’s you.”

“What?”

Timur shakes his head - there’s no time to hang himself over that. “You know what? Out. Get out. If you broke my window, I swear-” He steps closer, ready to push the man out, but the soldier grabs his arms, and the grip is leagues stronger than his own.

“You can try, but I will keep coming back. Until you get your life together. Spetsnaz do not give up so easily on their targets.”

Oh god, Spetsnaz were real and in Hereford. Timur knows what they are, obviously, and Sasha could tell legends of them. It’s another box he doesn’t have time to unpack. Something’s familiar about the man who has intruded into his apartment. “Who the hell are you?”

“You can call me Glaz.” The man - well, Glaz, apparently - drops Timur’s arm. “Sound familiar?” It does, but before Timur can say anything, Glaz reaches for his mask and pulls it down. Timur’s eyes widen as he takes a step back. Because plastered on the man - that’s his face, the face he sees in the mirror every morning. It’s covered in shades of green and brown, but it’s still his face. His long nose, his little beard that adorns his chin, his piercing eyes.

“Glaz. Taken from my name - Timur Glazkov.” 


	2. i want u back

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> timur's life takes a spin. up or down?

He can’t believe it. It’s not possible, right? His...clone? Evil twin? Long lost twin, even? Or a con artist who bears a very uncanny resemblance to him.

“Your room’s a mess.” Glaz noted, toeing one of the piles of clothes with his boots. “And your shelves are very dusty. When was the last time you cleaned?”

Timur, bewildered, makes a little “I’unno.” as he sits back down on his bed and puts his head in his hands. Oh my god. There was certainly a lot to unpack right now, and he wasn’t sure if he wants to really process the entire thing. He’s not dreaming, is he? “...I’m going to go back to sleep, and pretend this is a dream.” He says as he starts to pull the covers over himself, but Glaz grabs his arm and drags him out of bed.

“ _Absolutely not_.” He snarls. “Starting today, you will not be sleeping past noon. You can take care of yourself - do it.”

He feels like he’s a teenager. He isn’t, he’s well past that age. “Yes, I can, but also…” He wildly gestures at Glaz. “Is there an explanation, or…?”

“Explanation for what?” Glaz asks, as if they are not two lookalikes who share the same room and existence. It should be physically impossible.

“This! You’re me! I’m you! We’re us!” Wait, that last part didn’t make sense. “That- that is my face! What are you doing with my face!”

“...” Glaz stares back. “...It’s not a question of what I’m doing with your face, if it belongs to both of us.”

“Well, there’s no way you’re me. Absolutely not.” At this point, Timur was trying to grasp at straws here. “ _Who are you_?”

“Like I said. Timur Glazkov. Callsign, Glaz. Member of the Spetsnaz.”

“...” The first part was true for Timur, but...Glaz? Spetsnaz? “...I never joined the military.”

“Shame you didn’t, you make an excellent sniper.”

This is giving him a headache. Timur wants to curl up and maybe cry, but also he can’t cry because there is a trained soldier in his room, and also he can’t sleep because, you know, there’s someone in his room. “So why are there...two Timur Glazkovs now? What are you going to do, how are you going to get back?”

“Like this.” Glaz raises his fingers and snaps, and suddenly he’s gone. Timur rises with a start, waving his hand where Glaz was, but there’s nothing. He looks around the room, and it’s like he vanished without a trace. 

“...Huh. That was...weird.” Well, time to sleep again and hope that he doesn’t see Glaz anytime soon, because he really isn’t in the mood for hallucinations. But when he turns again to his bed, Glaz is sitting cross legged on the pillow.

“How many times do I have to say it? You are not sleeping past noon.”

“...Can you at least take your boots off if you’re going to sit like that on my bed?”

“...Fine.”

Timur collapses into the chair by his bed. Oh my god, this really is happening. He reaches for his phone, and briefly considers texting for help, but he’s certain the way Glaz is looking at him that he would sooner die.

“...So. You are Timur Glazkov. And I am Timur Glazkov. So in the future, do I join the military?”

“More like in another universe. Where you are headed, Timur, in this universe, is not going to be good for you if you are going to lie around and do nothing.”

“Yes, I _know_ that.” Timur hisses back as he puts a jacket on. “What, so you’re some other version of me, sent here to help me? If I needed help, I would have asked Sasha, Shuhrat, Maxim, Lera-”

“But I don’t see you texting Lera or Shuhrat. You ghost Sasha until he comes to bust your door down, and you and I both know Maxim is no help at all, and would sooner sell your soul for a bag of chips.”

Well, he’s got him there. At least Timur knows that Glaz is legit, unless Glaz has been watching him. “You know Maxim?”

“Yes. He’s an excellent hunter, where I’m from. Callsign Kapkan. Can gut you in five different ways. Always has a knife on him.”

Timur thinks of his version of Maxim, who makes constant references to six-second comedic videos, and disappears for weeks only to post photos in the wilderness, face down in the foliage and vegetation, who Timur spotted at the strangest areas - always at 3 am. “...My Maxim speaks in nothing but Vines.” He says.

Glaz sagely nods as he gets off the bed. “Miss Keisha is a favourite of his.”

It was. “...And what of Shuhrat?”

Glaz tells him of the Spetsnaz that apparently makes up the Spetsnaz portion of a Counter-Terrorism Task Force called Rainbow Six. It’s hard to believe Lera, a medical student, as a combat medic. To think of Shuhrat as a murderous demolitionist with cluster charges that could kill hostages. To even visualize Sasha, an old family man who...well, Timur actually didn’t know what he worked as. Hell, he probably retired. But old Aleksandr Senaviev operating a _machine gun_?

“There’s even worse, you know. Tell me, how many French people do you know, and why do you think it is five?”

“...Five?” Timur asks. “I know four. Emmanuelle. Gilles. Olivier. Julien-”

“Twitch, Montagne, Lion, Rook. And Doc?”

His doctor? “...Doctor Kateb, you mean? I…”

“French as well. You know 7 Americans. Two Australians. Two Koreans. Two Brazilians. Two Poles-”

It sucks that he knows what he’s talking about. Who he’s talking about. He plays poker with four of the Americans. Max and Tori operate the mechanic shop across the street. Grace complains about Kyung-hwa, and how he’s such a bore. The Bosak sister rivalry has been the talk of the town. “Well, they’re sisters. Tori and Max are friends, not to mention former colonies-”

“Even so. One Thai with a prosthetic arm. One Italian with a cigar habit he just can’t kick, one Danish influencer you see on his phone all the time, one Dutch who looks like Sia.”

...He never really made the connection that Nienke looked like Sia before. “...She does resemble her a bit…”

“Right? _God_ , you’re slow for me.”

“Because I’m _not_ you, but I am you at the same time.” Timur snaps back. “I just woke up and found out this alternate me exists and is going to get my life together. Let me process. So, what, you’re saying all of that is for...a reason?”

“Yes. You’ve had enough time to process. Now, you act. The only way for you to get me out of your life for good and to write this off as a dream is to get your life together. You don’t even have to be like me.” He leans forward. “ _You are not satisfied with your life. I will not leave until you are._ ”

There’s going to be a lot of things he’ll have to change, then.

He hates this.

* * *

“Hey, you okay?”

Timur looks up from his register. “Hm?” The art shop is, as always, in a period of downtime, where the employees can afford to slack off a tiny bit more. Across from him are Grace, and the third worker for the shift, Jordan Trace.

“Geez, you look tired.” He says. “Think you’ll be able to make poker night? I mean, you missed last week, and the week before that, and Eliza and the others are gettin’ kinda worried.”

Timur brings himself to nod. “Of course. Yeah. Just woke up earlier than expected.”

Jordan buys it, and goes into the backroom. Grace is still at the counter. “...Your eyebags look worse.” She says, after a bit. “Did the shaved ice keep you up?”

“No.” Timur immediately says, but backtracks on that. “Well, a bit. I just had some strange dream. Or nightmare, however you see it.” Truth be told, he doesn’t know how to tell her an alternate version of himself who could snipe him from across the town showed up and told him his entire life, his entire reality, all the relationships he’s made, are all lies.

“Really?” Great, Grace is interested. “And what happened?”

He wants to nudge her towards what Glaz told him, but at the last second, he goes against it. “I dreamt I was on a boat, but it was going down a highway at a very high speed.” He said. “And there were five people, it was Shuhrat, James, Dominic, Gilles, and the...the Sebastian guy. And they were wearing military gear.”

“The guy from Quebec?” Grace clarified. “Yeah, don’t know either.”

“Anyways, they were acting like a boyband, and they were serenading me, but I don’t remember if they were even singing or if they were just saying things, because their voices sounded...autotuned. And then the ship began sinking into the concrete, and I sank with it, and I was _inside_ the concrete. I could feel it in my lungs, and I tried to scream but my throat muscles just twitched because I couldn’t feel anything but concrete-”

“Okay, that’s enough!” She holds her hands up. “Geez, I regret asking now.”

“Dreams are a personal matter, Grace.” Jordan says, from the backroom. “You’ve been thinking of joining the military? Didn’t take you for that guy.”

“...What?” Timur turns around. “What gave you that idea?”

“Dunno. I mean, there’s your dream, and the sketch you showed us, and the little thing you put here.”

That gets Timur’s attention. “...What sketch?” 

“It was at the start of the shift, you came out here, told us you made a little sketch and wanted to show us. It was this guy in military gear - you were like, kinda aggressive about it, too.”

Timur was in the bathroom at the start, on his phone. It’s how he usually goes about his shifts. It means one thing - that was Glaz, on the floor. “Was I? Sorry, it must have been the...lack of sleep. I drew that after my dream. Thought it would help me.” He improvises on the spot. A lie, and a truth. Which is it, really? They fall for it, obviously, but Timur doesn’t like what Jordan and Grace have implied. Glaz is intruding into his life whether he likes it or not. It’s a warning, and a sign that Timur knows him too well, because they’re the same person. Only Timur Glazkov could pick up on little details like what Jordan dropped. He makes his way to the backroom, and he gets the “little things” - a few sticky notes with doodles of Glaz.

“Guess that’s register duty for me, then.” Grace says as she takes his place. “Honestly, Timur, moving around would really do you good. Come on. Up and at ‘em.”

“Oh yeah, Timur, didn’t you say you were working on a painting?” Jordan asks. “I’m excited to see it.”

Internally, Timur panics, because it’s been a canvas with a few streaks on it for a good while now. “It’s...still a work in progress.” He says, mostly to convince himself it’s still worth working on. “But you’ll see it when it’s ready.”

He wasn’t ready.

* * *

He can take care of himself, Timur reminds himself, and that is why he is here at the supermarket. He hasn’t been here in a bit. God, what was he going to make tonight? What did he even need? There was a lot of questions he needed to answer.

It had to be “nutritionally balanced”, he imagined Glaz saying. So what was on sale, and looked relatively easy to cook? There were tomatoes on sale…

Pasta.

Okay, he knew where this was going. That was good, at least. Pasta, maybe with chicken or something, and maybe he could add this bag of bell peppers that he spots. Next is the pasta, which he knows nothing about. Well, he did know that some pastas went well with certain sauces, and other pastas didn’t. From experience, penne pasta worked, but there were two kinds. Penne _rigate_ and penne _lisce_ \- the one marked _rigate_ had little ridges, while _lisce_ was smooth on the outside. He weighs each bag on his hands. The only experience with pasta he remembers isn’t something he remembers well, so he chooses the smooth pasta-

“Timur?”

He looks to the source of the voice. There is his experience right now, the Italian known as Adriano Martello. Wanderer, teacher...something else, once. Never seen without a cigar in his mouth - unless he’s in a no smoking area. Which this place is.

“...Hello, Martello. It’s been a while.” He waves.

Adriano’s mouth stretches into a bit of a smile. Normally he’s very boisterous, but now he’s subdued, for a good reason. “It has.” He agrees. “Are you making pasta? Because penne _lisce_ isn’t exactly...the best. If you don’t mind my intrusion.”

“It’s not?”

The man shakes his head, and the best way to describe his face is more of a grimace. “It’s smooth. _Rigate_ is better, the ridges keep the sauce in, with _lisce_ , the sauce falls off if you even touch it.”

“Ah.” Timur says, picking the bag out of his cart and replacing it with the apparently superior _rigate_. Who is he to argue with the Italian himself? He remembers someone calling Adriano “Papa Pasta”, but no recollection of who. “Thank you.” He adds, as an afterthought. “It’s nice to see you again.”

Adriano smiles at that, and he can see a bit more of the extrovert coming back out, into the slow comfort zone. “I’m making the family recipe, if you’d like to come over, on the weekend maybe?”

“No, thank you for the offer, though.” Timur says. “I’m...busy then. Shuhrat invited me over.” Which is a lie.

The smile falters, but Adriano pushes through. “That’s alright. Maybe another day, if you still have my number, I’m sure we can schedule something.”

“I’d love that.” Timur says, but knows that Adriano and him will play a game of texting each other, one single meetup, and then never speak again.

As he’s about to leave the supermarket, he gets a text.

* * *

_Time: 17:27_

**Shuhrat:** Hey, Timur. Would you like to come over and hang out with Sasha and I this weekend?

Sorry, I don’t think I can. Adriano is back in town.

 **Shuhrat:** Oh, okay. I guess you two are still working things out?

 **Shuhrat:** Well, if you change your mind. We’re always open.

Okay.

* * *

That evening is thankfully quiet. Glaz gives him an approving nod as he cooks his pasta. “To be honest, I didn’t expect you and Adriano to have a history of all people.”

“...Let me guess.” Timur says as he stirs the pasta - the tomatoes and spices he’s added make a lovely aroma that floats through the kitchen. “Also a counter-terrorist operative or whatever.”

“Operator, and yes. Callsign Maestro. GIS. Italy’s highest prestige in the military. Still smokes cigars, a good cook, and hits it off with an operator every week.”

“Every week?” Adriano didn’t strike him as that type, but then again...

“He likes smoke play-”

Timur’s face goes red, like the tomatoes he’ll be putting in. “Okay, okay, I _know_ that. I’m the one who was with him two months ago, I should know-”

“He also-”

“Oh my god, shut up!” Timur launches the wooden spoon at Glaz, who side steps and watches it bounce off the wall, chuckling to himself. “I don’t know about you, but I am _not_ improving my life by satisfying Adriano’s kinks.”

“You never know.” Glaz is teasing him, he knows it, but the vulgar conversation is something Timur doesn’t want to have. “But still. He seemed so eager to see you again.”

“...I was, too. But it won’t work. I guess he’s too much of a...wanderer. Likes seeing new horizons. People. Exploring, I think that’s the word. It’ll get complicated.”

“So you won’t talk?” Glaz counters. “Give him the time of day. Don’t lie to him, and don’t lie to Shuhrat either. Just say you’re not in the mood, or you can discuss it later. Not just put it off over and over.”

“It’s not as simple as that.” Timur glances at his phone on the counter, where he hasn’t received a message yet. “They’re going to get concerned because I haven’t talked to them in a while now, and then Shuhrat or Maxim will be kicking down my door again, or Adriano will take it upon himself to be my personal chef, or-”

Glaz’s next words pierce him. “Is that a bad thing from time to time?”

Timur stays silent at that. “...Well, they’re...they shouldn’t be concerning themselves with me. I can learn on my own. I am an adult, aren’t I? I’m 24, I’d rather learn by myself.”

“...It’s not about learning.” Glaz is about to say more, but Timur’s phone vibrates. 

* * *

_Time: 18:36_

**Jordan:** Yo

 **Jordan:** You’re coming to poker right

Yes. I’ll be there at 8:30.

 **Jordan:** Cool, see you then

 **Jordan:** glad to have you back, buddy

 **Jordan:** :)

* * *

“Remember, Timur. I am not the only one who wants to see you improve.” Glaz says. “Keep that in mind, _da_?”

And then he’s gone, and there’s nothing but the pasta to keep Timur company. He takes a cursory taste of the sauce.

...Adriano’s was better.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i love hearing your comments, so please go ahead and leave what you think, no matter what!

**Author's Note:**

> might continue this or i might not idk


End file.
